Left Alone

There is a particular cruelty in being left alone while harm is done to you.

Not the solitude one chooses.

Not the quiet of reflection.

But the isolation that is imposed — where every door you turn to for safety is closed, and every system that should protect you, instead, looks away.

That kind of loneliness is not accidental.

It is structural.

It is profound human cruelty.

I was made to feel unsafe everywhere I turned.

Personally.

At work.

Within regulatory systems.

Inside institutions that spoke endlessly of care, values, and protection — while offering none of it in practice.

Interference: When Family Trauma Is Reopened and Exploited

My family carries a deep and painful history of interference.

Unsafe relatives interfered repeatedly in our family life when we were children.

They exploited vulnerabilities.

They crossed boundaries.

They destabilised relationships.

They targeted.

That interference did not merely cause conflict — it contributed to catastrophic harm.

It played a role in my father’s breakdown and suicide.

This is not metaphor.

It is history.

Our family learned, at great cost, that interference can destroy lives.

That trauma never left our nervous systems.

So when, years later, institutions and senior executives intruded into my most vulnerable moments — into my grief, my home, my family, my private life — the wound was not new.

It was reopened.

The exploitation of vulnerability.

The invasion of privacy.

The use of family circumstances as leverage.

The expectation that I would absorb it quietly, professionally, alone.

The same pattern, in a different uniform.

Being Left to Carry the Burden Alone

What compounded the harm was not only what was done — but who was missing.

There was no trauma-informed response.

No protective buffering.

No meaningful recognition of cumulative harm.

No understanding of family trauma, grief, or psychological injury.

I was left alone to navigate:

• institutional harassment,
• retaliation for speaking up,
• misuse of private family information,
• escalating psychological injury,
• and a regulatory system that treated trauma as inconvenience.

I was expected to carry this burden quietly, competently, and without visible distress — while the harm itself continued.

This is not resilience-building.

It is abandonment.

It was not only what was done to me — but the fact that I was left without a support network while it was happening.

I was isolated.

I was shamed.

I was made to feel responsible.

And I was expected to carry the entire burden of serious systemic abuse and systemic failure alone.

I was subtly — and sometimes explicitly — made to feel that the problem was me.

That I was difficult.

That I was demanding.

That I was emotional.

That I should manage it better.

That I should be quieter.

That I should absorb more.

This is how guilt and shame are weaponised against people who speak up.

When Regulators Breach Their Own Obligations

The regulators did not merely fail to protect me.

They breached their own statutory obligations.

It was easier to hide behind a computer.

Easier to deflect.

Easier to delay.

Easier to proceduralise trauma out of existence.

Easier to push the burden back onto the injured person.

That choice is not neutral.

It is precisely this attitude — this avoidance, this deflection, this ethical failure — that causes psychological injury in our workplaces.

And it has been modelled, repeatedly, by SIRA NSW and SafeWork NSW.

When those charged with protecting workers demonstrate indifference, minimisation, or hostility toward harm, the damage does not stop.

It escalates.

Regulators Must Not Become Secondary Perpetrators

Targets of abuse at work do not need WHS regulators to add to the abuse.

They need compassion.

They need protection.

They need to be believed.

They need intervention — not obstruction.

Frontline SafeWork NSW staff, acting under managerial direction, hanging up on a victim of serious workplace abuse for three and a half hours is not a service failure.

It is serious abuse.

And it tells injured workers everything they need to know about how safe it is to seek help.

A Warning Based on Lived Experience

I repeat what I have said this year — including on the public record in the NSW Parliament:

If you are being seriously harassed and abused at work, and you report that abuse through SafeWork NSW’s Speak Up form, you should expect to be shut down and/or subjected to further harmful treatment and gross negligence.

That is not a theoretical risk.

It is lived experience.

But Not in 2026

Not anymore.

Not in silence.

Not in isolation.

Not one by one.

In 2026, we are uniting to speak collectively — because this must finally be called out.

Public money comes with public accountability.

And when regulators know the harm —

document it —

receive it —

witness it —

and still do nothing —

they are no longer bystanders.

They know the harm.

And knowledge creates responsibility.

SafeWork NSW and the Absence of Trauma-Informed Protection

A system that claims to protect workers but lacks trauma-informed training is not neutral.

It is dangerous.

For years, I encountered a regulatory culture — particularly within SafeWork NSW — that demonstrated:

• a failure to understand psychological injury,
• a failure to recognise institutional betrayal,
• a failure to protect workers from reprisals by senior executives of a PCBU,
• and a failure to account for the impact on families.

Processes were rigid.

Responses were procedural.

Human context was stripped away.

I was not met with care.

I was met with deflection.

And while this occurred, I was isolated — navigating a cruel, zero trauma-informed system entirely on my own.

Do Not Believe the Lies

Do not believe the lies of the WHS Minister.

Do not believe the polished narratives that claim workers are “irreplaceable” while the system quietly destroys them.

Do not believe campaigns funded with public money that mask misconduct beneath slogans — while failing to implement genuine trauma-informed protections.

Because behind those campaigns:

• workers are still being targeted,
• families are still being harmed,
• senior executives still escape accountability,
• regulators still lack the training required to understand trauma,
• and the human cost is still borne by individuals left alone.

Words without protection are not values.

Campaigns without accountability are not reform.

They are cover.

Unsafe Everywhere

One of the most destabilising aspects of institutional abuse is the collapse of refuge.

Work is unsafe.

Reporting is unsafe.

Regulators are unsafe.

Escalation is unsafe.

Silence is unsafe.

Speaking is unsafe.

There is nowhere to stand.

Your body absorbs the threat — hypervigilance, exhaustion, fear — not because you are weak, but because your environment is hostile.

Human beings are not meant to endure prolonged harm without support.

When they are forced to, the injury becomes systemic.

Silence Is Not Neutral

What wounded me most was not only what was done.

It was the absence of anyone saying:

• “This is wrong.”
• “You are not alone.”
• “We will intervene.”
• “Your family matters too.”

When institutions do not intervene, they are not passive observers.

They become participants.

A Moral Line That Was Crossed

There is a moral line crossed when a person is isolated, targeted, and left to carry unbearable weight alone — especially when that isolation is enabled by systems meant to protect.

This is not a misunderstanding.

It is not an administrative failure.

It is not an unfortunate oversight.

It is a breach of humanity.

Loneliness imposed by power is a form of violence.

And naming it matters.

Because silence is how these systems survive.

To be left alone in harm is not resilience.

It is cruelty.

And no amount of branding, messaging, or political reassurance can change that truth.

View:

SafeWork NSW’s Irreplaceable Campaign

How much the SafeWork NSW Irreplaceable campaign cost taxpayers

My Family

My personal story - Part 11 - Family

 “…what I do know for sure is that women don’t need men to simply give us help - we need men … to believe in us in order for our traumas to heal.”  

Lady Gaga, Stefani Germanotta. Foreword in Trauma: The invisible epidemic. By Dr. Paul Conti. 

Today is my birthday. It is a day of pain: of loneliness, loss, disenfranchised grief, feeling silenced and, yes, of trauma. It’s all caused from trauma.

The trauma was caused by human behaviour and emotional abuse. It was caused by a silencing of my need to speak, my need to express how I felt and why, and a refusal to respect my needs in return. That was coupled with a sense of entitlement to take everything I wished for, each year, for my birthday, with no remorse and no regard for the state I was left in. And that’s not even including the evil I became a target of, again in my life, all because I requested some agreed boundaries for a safe work environment. 

Now I’m all alone, suffering and forced to live with disenfranchised grief. Every birthday I wished for a family of my own. That’s what I wished for, as I blew out those candles. 

My mum would say to me, the greatest lottery is finding a good man to marry. If children come along, that’s an additional blessing. 

She’s right. If, all these years, I did not succeed in finding one good man, what does that tell us about our society and its values today? Did I fail, or was I failed? 

The worst part of disenfranchised grief comes from people who believe it’s their right to force their own opinions onto a person silently suffering. My manager was one example. I remember a time being in her office, doing the brilliant work I always did for her and for the university. I don’t remember why and how this conversation came about, but she implied that it was my fault for not having a family, and that I can have a child on my own. The tone in how it was conveyed, intensified my internal pain. I tried to respond but all I could do was place my head in my hands, something I tend to do when I feel “defeated” with such insensitive words and behaviour. This is an example of what people experiencing disenfranchised grief are confronted with, like the suppressed grief itself isn’t enough. 

Because I could never get a word in edgewise to respond to such unsolicited comments (it’s pointless to even try with such personality types), I’d sit outside the chapel on campus, and when my dear friend and colleague, the campus minister, would walk by, I’d share my reply with her. Here’s what I said that day: I don’t tell people how to live their lives. Their choices and their private life is their business. I care who they are in how they treat people in their everyday interactions. So I don’t accept people telling me how to live my life. It’s not their place and it’s not their right. 

I don’t appreciate people forcing their opinions and judgements onto me. For me, it started with marriage. Marriage is a sacrament. Marriage is blessed. Marriage is sacred. God Himself said at Creation that it is not good for man to be alone, he needed a helper. For me, that included someone who would have my back, and would believe in me, as I would believe in him. But I only encountered men who helped themselves (so to speak) and contributed the final blow of trauma and loss with a big serving of shame and humiliation. 

We each have a right to feel safe in our grief and trauma. With personality types like the example I gave, it’s private and none of their business, for obvious reasons. I guarded myself as best I could (given the circumstances), and never wished or agreed to discuss it. But the more “private” you are, the more speculative gossip occurs. A person in such an environment is damned if they do, damned if they don’t. 

So below I share my journal entry I wrote on my 21st birthday. Why the tone of gloom? The dampener on my mood came from a cousin, the same covert narcissistic personality type as the manager. Then these people wonder why they end up burning their bridges with everyone they encounter in their lives. They are energy vampires who don’t know when to stop interfering, gossiping and when to mind their own business. But they do leave a trail of harm and trauma in their wake. 

 

Everyone had a nice time. It was a simple backyard barbecue. My dad’s perfectly marinated lamb souvlakia on a charcoal BBQ were the best. My mum’s cheese triangles (tiropitakia), and just so much beautiful food served generously with a huge dose of love, it was simple and enjoyable. I’m sad that my journal entry does not reflect that. I’ve now explained why. There’s more behind the sentence, “I don’t think that life will be enjoyable or easy.” I’m an empath. The constant shitty energy that comes from a narcissist enters my pores like poison. It’s toxic. 

I find it very interesting that I wrote, “People say ‘life is what you make of it’, but sometimes other people have a way of making life for you, and that is not necessarily a good thing.”

I made the most out of my life: education, career, healthy finances, travel, social, hobbies, to name a few. But what this cousin started, others chose to finish. 

I’m related to narcissistic and psychopathic personality types. My family and I had enough crappy interfering experiences to cause harm, as I was growing up. They finally “achieved” an “outcome” of taking my dad’s life. I did not need a VC, in a university that has a commitment to the dignity of the human person in its mission, intentionally set a psychopath on me and my family, because I finally couldn’t tolerate the narcissistic manager’s suffocating harassment. It was seriously affecting my health and well-being. 

I was not going to let more harm come to me and my family by yet more narcissists and psychopaths. I was about to put up the fight of my life. That’s what truly strong women do. They are grounded in their values, and they despise hypocrisy and sham dealings. 

Below is the first page of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Ironically, this was done in a professional development course at my work. It is the rarest of the 16 personality types, statistically only 1-2% of the population. Why is it so rare? 

“INFJs have a gift for intuitively understanding complex meanings and human relationships. They are conscientious, committed to their firm values, and quietly forceful. They develop a clear vision about how best to serve humanity and are likely to be organised and decisive in implementing their vision.

They value home, family, health, friendships, spirituality, and learning.”

I’m definitely grounded in my values. But I’ve had too much interference and harm in attempt to destroy or derail me from my values. 

I have a home I worked hard to own, yet sadly without another person living in it with me. If my university employer does not stop the systemic wage theft and defrauding me (and the VC is fully aware), I might lose my safe “home”. 

I have no family of my own, because men I dated or met were self-centred, narcissistic, emotionally abusive or purely egocentric. 

I have friendships, but my friends have their own partners and children. That’s the priority in this stage of life. That was my priority too. But I’m left with nothing. 

My health is suffering, see above for reasons why. 

I’ve written a post that shows the value I place on learning and education. Later I will write a post about my career in what I value: learning and education. See http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/11/my-personal-story-part-10-education.html

My spirituality and faith is stronger than ever. My faith is separate to the hypocrisy and social justice crisis I’ve been calling out. That is a strong example of my INFJ values. See http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/11/my-personal-story-part-9-faith.html

 

I’ll go through the other two pages in this brief report in a later post. 

But I have trauma from the gravity of abuse directed at me. I fought a battle that I did not sign up for. I did not enlist in the military, I did not get deployed to a war zone. It should also not have felt eerily like a Cold War. 

It’s important to tell my story, so society knows what this battle is. People must learn and become aware of the human rights being fought for here, for all of us. But the abuse must now STOP. 

How can there be healing when the abuse hasn’t stopped? 

Too many times over the last several years, I found myself paralysed with fear. What’s worse, I was all alone, with no support network.

For years, the one time I needed a supportive network surrounding me, I was deliberately isolated, neglected, abandoned and worst of all, emotionally abused by those agencies I trusted and who had a legal responsibility to ensure our safety in workplaces. Namely, SafeWork NSW.

How do I heal from everything that was taken away from me? 

At least with my employer, everything stolen must and will be returned, by law. They have a duty of care to comply with laws and regulations, and to provide a safe work environment. They must be held accountable for intentionally setting a psychopath on me and my family in diabolical adverse action. 

SafeWork NSW have a statutory duty to redress all the harm their gross negligence caused me and my family, for all these years they were derelict in their duties. They all have a duty of care to keep this family safe and to assist with the process of healing from this workplace trauma. 

If my family want to do something as a gift for my birthday, call SafeWork NSW and report what happened to this entire family. Here’s the reference number: PSY-2711-864238. 

PS. I miss mum. 

https://myersbriggspersonalitytest.org/what-is-the-most-rare-personality-type/

My personal story so far:

• My personal story - Part 1

• In his memory

• My personal story - Part 2 - There is no authenticity anymore

• My personal story - Part 3 - Greek Independence Day - A Revolution

• My personal story - Part 4 - War and Peace

• My personal story - Part 5 - Mark Foys and Ladies in Black

• My personal story - Part 6 - Early childhood and my first exposure to narcissism

• My personal story - Part 7 - St. Mary’s Star of the Sea

• My personal story - Part 8 - Bethany College

• Interlude - Mrs. Harris goes to Paris

• My personal story - Part 9 - Faith

• My personal story - Part 10 - Education

My personal story - Part 10 - Education

“In my experience in education and society, I’ve observed that the greatest minds are the most down to earth and humble.”

Vicki Bourbous

After high school, my goal was to study at university and earn a degree. I achieved that goal, more than once. I love learning and expanding my mind. It’s my strength. It’s my gift. It’s my passion. Data becomes information. Information becomes knowledge. Knowledge is a pathway to wisdom. 

Education is not the only pathway to wisdom, and doesn’t always lead to wisdom. My maternal grandmother did not have a formal education, but she was a wise woman. Women like my grandmother are pure at heart. Through a combination of lived experience, intuition, faith, grounded values, courage, perception and other authentic qualities, especially humility, people like my yiayia reach a level of wisdom that is greater than many others who have PhD qualifications. 

It starts with humility.

In my experience within the higher education sector, regardless of academic level, such as professorship, those with the greatest minds are the most down to earth and humble. Their wisdom, beyond what they’re teaching in a unit of study, is what inspires. 

I miss the dialogue and connection with like-minded professionals, like the one I’ve shared in this post from my LinkedIn connections. This topic of discussion was from about four years ago, before the systemic abuse I encountered really escalated. 

I miss this so much. Perhaps that’s why I’m such a target from those with extreme arrogance that leads to no good, especially jealousy. I don’t know. It does, however, communicate clearly who they are: dark tetrad personalities. They have infiltrated the Australian university sector, which is why it’s resulted in a senate inquiry. The organisational culture has become rotten. Dark tetrad personalities have no place in higher education. 

This social justice battle, however, has also allowed me to connect with other leaders and warriors fighting for the same fair work conditions, human rights, dignity, safety, peace, and calling out truth to power. 

It does re-affirm my words quoted above. I’ve seen a lot more arrogance and ego (and greed) in the last few years, and far too little in the way of humility and respect. 

Bachelor of Education (Hons.) - University of Sydney

I remember my first year at university. It was a culture shock as I adjusted to life as a University of Sydney student. It included cheap food at the Manning Bar next to the newly built Faculty of Education building. It included end of semester uni parties and making lifelong friends.

It included lots of time in Fisher Library researching assignments and encountering students of all quirks and eccentricities, backgrounds and political persuasions. I still remember the smell of musty books gushing out in a whirlwind at 8am when the sliding doors of Fisher Library would open and some of us would make a beeline for the high demand room. 

I had the opportunity to study interesting subjects in the Faculty of Arts, like Anthropology. I loved the fact that our lecturers informed us the deadline for an assignment to be dropped in the assignment box was Friday 5pm, but that the office staff don’t check the box until 8am the following Monday morning (hint hint). It was a built in weekend extension. I lost weekends finalising those anthropology essays, but it earned me distinctions. The opportunity cost was worth it. 

I took Anthropology into my second year. My other elective, Psychology, was too dry and scientific. But Psychology 101 is taken up by so many first year students of all walks of life. They are spilling out of the lecture theatre in the first few months of first year university… until people start dropping off or dropping out. 

It was in such a lecture I remember someone asking the lecturer a question. Actually, this guy stood up and started Bible bashing. I was amused, others were annoyed, collectively I think many of us considered it disrespectful to the lecturer and to us as fellow students.

The reason I remember this intriguing moment is because not long after, as I and my lifelong friend from those Education studies days, were settling into a different lecture theatre in another location on campus, this time for our theoretical Education studies, that same Bible bashing guy was up the front, at the podium, and he calls out, “You Education students are a bunch of airheads.” I smiled, turned to my friend Sonia and said, “Yep, and damn proud of it.” 

My friends know I call myself an intellectual airhead. They know why. I’ve always been conscientious, passionate about lifelong learning, gifted in the humanities and social sciences (hence pursuing second year Anthropology and running a million miles away from the thought of a second year studying Psychology). But I also know I’ve been very naive, I wasn’t street wise, and needed jokes explained to me because I didn’t get the punchline the first time round. I also willingly gave people the benefit of the doubt and generally believed the world was a good place. 

Perhaps it was this combination that made me a target of abuse by those that belong in what’s been described as Dark Tetrad Personalities: Psychopaths, Narcissists, Machiavellians, and what has now been added, turning the Triad into Tetrad - Sadists. (Read more at https://psychcentral.com/pro/exhausted-woman/2015/11/the-dark-tetrad-possibly-the-scariest-boss#3).

But I’m a fast learner, and this “network” of dark tetrad personalities didn’t expect me to be strong-willed, firmly grounded in my values and choosing to fight back for the dignity of the human person and common good. They didn’t count on my level of stubbornness that my family have been fully aware of, from the day I was born. 

As a child, my stubbornness was frustrating to my family. As an adult, combined with my humanitarian values, it’s been a grace from God (He calls it Perseverance). I chose, by His Gift of Free Will, to persevere for the greater good of society. My stubbornness also saved my life through this massive ordeal over the last several years. But I have sat in the pews of churches, looked up at my Crucified Lord, and literally said, “Lord, You are testing my patience.” Perhaps there was a reason for that too. Only God knows why, and Patience is another grace. We live in a world lacking in patience. 

Going back to those uni days, fast forward to second or third year university, with more practical teaching work injected into the curriculum mix. In a Science and Technology curriculum workshop, we were tasked with making a windmill using a plastic water bottle, hot glue and a few other things. I’ll never forget the tutor telling us that, “No one has left this workshop without a working windmill.” I jokingly said to my uni friends, “He hasn’t met me yet.” 

Let’s just say, I stuffed it up (do not EVER hand me a flat pack to assemble). The tutor repeated to me, “No one has left this workshop without a working windmill,” while literally willing to give me $2 to go to the Manning Bar and buy another bottle of water. It was bad enough I stuffed up a primary school project as a training teacher. The least I could do was pay for a replacement plastic bottle. The tutor stepped in to make my working windmill, which I proudly walked around campus, holding it up and watching it spin in the breeze. 

I am, indeed, an intellectual airhead, and yes, I’m proud of it. But I think I’ll stick to my love for literature and leave the science experiments for others to handle.

Master of Information Management - University of NSW

From 2001-2003, for three years, two nights a week, 6pm-9pm, I traveled after work, from Strathfield to the UNSW campus at Kensington. I was diligently working on my Masters degree in Information Management. I enrolled part time while I worked, developed skills, experience, and a professional network of connections. 

Perhaps being on campus after business hours, and perhaps because it was postgraduate studies, I had a different relationship with my lecturers-in-charge. It was one of equity and mutual respect in this fascinating profession, especially in units of study still offered from the perspective of librarianship. 

UNSW used to offer a brilliant course in librarianship and records management. However, on 2nd December 1996, at a Council meeting, the Faculty of Professional Studies was disestablished, effective 1st January 1997.

The  Master of Information Management (MIM) was moved into the Faculty of Commerce and Economics, under the School of Information Systems, Technology and Management (SISTM) from 1998. It was from 2003 that Information Management started being phased out, making it difficult for me to find relevant electives in my final year. 

The corporate decisions within university governance to “phase out” courses, while students are still enrolled, had started happening at this time, but not in the way it’s happening now.

To finish the course, I now faced limited options. Although it wasn’t ideal, the closest elective I could find to finish, graduate and apply for a job opportunity that had come up, was Data Management. The handbook claimed there were no prerequisites to enrol, but my essay writing, humanities and social sciences brain did not agree. The lecturer-in-charge was from a computer science background. For me, watching paint dry would have been less torture and a lot more fun. Credit to those who love and are great at this information systems design stuff, I am grateful to have scraped in with a Pass after a Distinction average record. 

I worked equally hard in this unit, but I have no understanding and application for this side of information. I’m the end user, the information consumer who’d be giving feedback on systemic design, from my research on information retrieval behaviour of end users. Of course the information systems and technology geeks have made progress since then, most recently in AI. 

I’m the one who’d research how this technology impacts the retrieval and use of information, the ethical or academic issues within the higher education teaching and learning environment, among other things. 

I almost failed that data management elective, of no fault of my own. That irrelevant unit to my career almost risked a potential job opportunity that had nothing to do with data management but everything to do with qualifying by successfully finishing this degree. Therefore, if university leaders think that their decisions about course cuts, including how they manage the process (effectively or not), has no impact on fee paying students and their careers and lives, they need to think again. 

Under the Faculty of Commerce and Economics, many of the information management units focused more on information as a corporate asset and commodity. I learnt about the cost of information, how it’s used to generate competitive intelligence reports, and the concepts of information architecture and (predictably one of my favourites), the organisation of knowledge, from an intellectual and theoretical standpoint. 

Where equivalent courses in other universities focused more on information as part of library sciences, education or cultural assets, like historical archives, libraries and museums, my course was angled toward information and its importance in a corporate environment. It is a fascinating multi-dimensional, multi-disciplinary and “hybrid” profession. 

My passion for my studies at UNSW, and my hard work, paid off. I won a scholarship prize that paid for one of my units (everything helps and I had 12 units to complete for my qualification); and I received an award for my work in one of my subjects (an opportunity for my family to meet my brilliant lecturers). 

I had a mutual respect for the academic teaching staff, who had encouraged me to pursue a PhD. This was my passion, my vocation, my work. Keep all this in mind for when I share a written response from Catholic Church Insurance in about October 2021, that was cruel and ridiculous. I demanded CCI respond to my questions via IRO in writing, so the CCI “leaders” went into “fight” mode, got nasty and, well, childish in their behaviour. 

They should have just complied. I will be sharing that desperate action and written bs, when I continue that part of my story next year. I’ll link back to this post so we can see if what Catholic Church Insurance “leaders” wrote on record, is true. 

But the Minns government has a lot to answer for in their contempt for workers and employee rights and entitlements too. Especially my local MP, Chris Minns. You can’t make this stuff up, if you tried. As history proves repeatedly, “emperors” have risen, but ultimately they do fall. We are all mortal and we are all human. 

What’s lacking in Dark Tetrad Personalities is HUMILITY. And for that matter, HUMANITY. 

I paid my Masters degree upfront as I worked. My HECS debt for my Bachelors degree was paid by this time in my life too. I was contributing honourably to our Australian society. My taxes were a contribution to the public purse that I, like others, trusted government leaders to use efficiently and with transparency, where it was needed. I never expected this level of disrespect and greed from our current government in a democratic society, especially from the current Minns government of NSW. I haven’t cost the government a cent in my life, but I found myself in a situation where the government was costing me … EVERYTHING. 

I was never going to allow the Minns government to get away with such serious mismanagement of public money, where our taxes were not enough. That we cannot avoid death and taxes is true. But for many of us, the Minns government tried to take everything we worked for beyond our due diligence of paying taxes, and then send us to our death.

I was not going to let that happen. 

Graduate Certificate of Higher Education - Australian Catholic University

ACU was a university where leaders were committed to its Mission and Identity. In 2007-2008 I had the opportunity to enrol and study part-time for the GCHE, alongside my academic colleagues. It was a great opportunity to apply my knowledge in both Education and Information Management to teaching and learning design within the higher education sector. 

It was also a great opportunity to be part of an online academic learning forum, and for building connections and future collaborations with my academic clients. The GCHE gave me insight into theoretical frameworks underpinning higher education teaching and learning in various environments.

I worked with brilliant academic staff. The memorable ones embodied humility and kindness. They were the Mission and Identity. 

See http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/01/quality-staff-and-university-leaders.html and http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/07/prohibited-workplace-surveillance.html.

What went wrong with those appointed to govern the university? Where are all these repeated WHS hazards and incidents of offensive abuse mentioned in policies aligned to legislation, the code of conduct for ALL staff and the Identity and Mission? 

See http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/10/its-what-you-do-that-defines-who-we-are.html, http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/07/intimidating-family-as-community.html and http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/02/questions-i-would-like-to-ask-my.html.

How is this serious misconduct from senior executives an example of respect and dignity, and acknowledging the huge contribution I have made for the benefit of my university community, since August 2001? 

Accountability must finally happen. Apart from my own volume of records, gathering the information I was unaware of (omitted to disadvantage me), is in progress. As I said, information becomes knowledge. Knowledge is a pathway to wisdom, but knowledge is also power. Omitting information employees had a legal right to know was a weapon used by senior executive to disempower their own valuable staff. Why would they choose to do that? 

The university “leaders” have a legal obligation to empower their valuable staff, not disempower them.

Below is the original post from Peter Cavanagh with an interesting question and quote. It was to this post I contributed my own thoughts:

My contribution:

I miss these professional discussions. Everything stolen must be returned. It was not “theirs” to take. 

 

Regarding Peter Cavanagh’s initial post, it goes back to this :  https://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2024/07/when-we-are-born.html.

My personal story - Part 9 - Faith

“Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them.”

Traditional All Souls Day prayer

Today, 2 November, is All Souls Day in the calendar of the Catholic Church. I’ll come back to why this is a significant date for me, in another post. 

For those who have been reading my story, it’s obvious that I’ve been handling and fighting multiple bad situations simultaneously. I may have written this before, but I’ll repeat it again. I believe it’s simple to be kind, but what I find easy, so many find really hard. And the kinder you are, the more you suffer in this world. 

I’ve learnt that no amount of kindness can combat cruelty in this world on its own. It needs faith and prayer. Spiritual warfare requires a spiritual weapon. I wasn’t in combat with individuals in my personal life or people at work or corrupt “systems” in this society. I believe good and evil, beyond our physical senses, do exist. 

Through all this suffering, my faith has become stronger. Perhaps I needed to go through all this to learn and to be closer to God. Faith is something personal to me and my journey.

Even so, I struggle to understand why all this is happening. I really don’t know how to bring light and kindness to such a cruel world so devoid of feeling. How can people hurt others so much and not care at all? It’s been too much in my lifetime already. I can’t let it happen to me again. Did I work hard and fight all these difficult battles for nothing?

When I was 18, I had a disturbing dream. I’ll quote from my journal entry what I wrote at the time:

“It was a dream I had a month ago. I had a dream that there were all these incredibly scary-looking demons dancing on top of my cupboard. One jumped off and grabbed my hand, pulling me to join them in their dance. I was fighting it and managed to escape, and started running. The demon chased me. I ran to the kitchen… where I said to my family, “the demons are after us”. I woke up then. I don't usually get scared of nightmares after I wake up, but this seemed so real, like I actually fought with it. I was so scared, I couldn't sleep the following night in fear that I would see it again.”

I felt like it was something I could not ignore, but something I’d have to fight, only not on my own. When all these concurrent battles got too much and I finally screamed out, “Why God? Why so much unfair pain in my life?” I used the gifts He gave me to search for the answer. I researched and read and read and read. The more I read, the more revealing and clear things became for me. 

My suffering has strengthened my faith. I’ve been attacked by so much evil since 2017, I now understand the dream that warned me.

Many times I get into the human habit of trying to do it myself, to resolve conflict, fight back on my own, losing sight of the one I should have trusted my fears, pain, sorrow, and suffering to. I needed to let in the light of Christ to bring peace, love, forgiveness, kindness, humility, understanding, compassion and wisdom. On my own, I became frustrated and made mistakes. 

In our human nature, we try to make sense of everything. We try to apply reason to a situation. The irony is, how many times are we unreasonable? 

When a person can learn to silence the screaming in their head (that is, ego and thoughts that are lies and hurt others), only then can a person listen to the whispers in their heart. God whispers, He doesn’t scream. And that’s where instinct lies. 

For me, the biggest lesson in this life journey was finding out that when you are true to your values, open to wisdom, discernment, and being insightful about events that happen, you will be attacked and persecuted. When you stand up for justice, for what you believe is right; when you ask challenging questions; or refute an argument that has no evidence, there are people who will either fight you or flee. Those reactions are motivated by pride in people who don’t want to change for the better. They don’t want to learn and grow in truth and love. They don’t want to learn from their mistakes. 

That’s why history repeats itself. If people learnt from the past, then why are we still in conflict on a personal level and war on a global level? But it is a choice each one of us can make. We have the gift of God’s free will to choose what we know to be right in our hearts, or follow the crowd because it feels “safe”, at least for now. But for how long? Peace, love and kindness for a better world requires a collective effort, but it starts with each individual. 

I’d love to visit places like Medjugorje and Fatima. I’ve read all the messages from Our Lady Queen of Peace at Medjugorje. For me, they bring comfort.

There was a Jubilee Pilgrimage to Medjugorje and Rome I wanted to join from 30 September to 13 October 2025. It is a sad irony that I could not fund this, and therefore could not go, because of the persecution, including wage theft and fraud as adverse action, by institutions of the Catholic Church in Australia. At the moment it feels like demons are chasing me from church institutions no matter where I turn. They will not win. 

The official theme of this Jubilee Year in the Catholic Church, in other words, a special “Holy Year”, is “Pilgrims of Hope”. I love that. It’s exactly what we need. Hope. 

It was Pope Francis who chose the theme to help “restore a climate of hope and trust.”

As I mentioned, given the institutional abuse I’m still a target of, a spiritual battle I never expected to be fighting at such a level, I could not go. 

It turned out God had other plans, because the day before the pilgrims departed, on the 29 September, 2025*, I was invited to give evidence in person at a hearing of the Public Accountability and Works Committee inquiry into a proposed workers compensation bill. It was an important contribution to make, for the common good and dignity of the human person. We are also a democracy, despite the Minns government having tried to undermine due process. 

I had written a letter to the chaplain accompanying the pilgrimage. I needed the prayers of the pilgrims that were going.

I’ve sent multiple petitions to Medjugorje over the years that I’ve had to fight these battles, now all alone and frightened. I wasn’t protected from battle, but surely I wasn’t alone. There were many times I asked God to take this bitter cup from me, but then I said, “Your Will, not mine.”

My faith, however, is and always will be separate from this hypocrisy. Jesus had already called out hypocrisy in His ministry (Matt. 23), and they crucified Him for it. He didn’t allow me to go through anything He didn’t go through first. But my hope lies in the Resurrection. I need to keep clinging to hope. I’m trying, but many times, it is difficult. 

I hope that what I’ve done, using the gifts God gave me, to serve the greater good of society, will save lives. Sometimes, I ask in my weakness and fear, “But who’s saving mine?” Then I remember that Pope Francis dedicated this Jubilee Year to one of Hope. I hope that I too, will be saved.

* 29 September is also the Feast Day of St. Michael the Archangel in the Catholic Church calendar. With everything I have been through, for me, in my heart, there are no coincidences. (http://mystory-myvoice.blogspot.com/2025/09/my-personal-story-part-8-bethany-college.html).